CIOs in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) are buying into the idea of consolidation, according to a report funded by network infrastructure company Brocade.

Brocade said out of the 600 CIOs in the EMEA region it spoke with, 76 percent thought it would be their biggest challenge over the next year as they struggled to reduce management complexity (61 percent) and increase mobility and agility (38 percent).

This is driving demand for simpler networking infrastructure, according to Brocade. 

After consolidation, virtualization and security were named as the next important areas of concern for CIOs in the region.

Seventy percent of the CIOs interviewed said they were looking to consolidate existing servers, 56 storage, 54 databases and 49 percent networks, while 47 percent said consolidation plans would focus on applications in the year ahead.

Brocade EMEA vice president Alberto Soto said Brocade